Teach Yourself Stitch Craft and Dressmaking Volume IV: Pattern Drafting for Men and Practice Drafts - Trying your hand at drafting shirts

Introduction

In my previous books of this series, I touched a little bit upon pattern drafting, and how you can make your own patterns with a little bit of know-how. But when you are doing the pattern drafting for men, the drafting is going to be different than what how you do it for women and children. That is, of course, natural, because the body build is different, and so are the measurements.

For example, the proportion of the depth of scye [i.e – the distance from the neck to the armpit] is going to change, according to the size of the chest. In tailoring, this is called a working scale. This working scale is a means of comparison from which we are able to compute the relative values of the depth and the width in their relation to the circumference of the chest. This is normally done in men as per the table given on the next page.

Number | Chest measurement | Working scale

1 | Up to 71 cm – 28 inches | Half the chest, +1.5 cm [1/2 inches]

2 | From 71 – 92 cm [28 – 36 inches] | Half the chest

3 | From 92 cm [36 inches] and more | 1/3 chest +15 cm [6 inches]

You can see from number 3 that the scale is going to give the essential decreasing ratio of depth qualities. These are necessary for large sizes. When the chest is more than 36 inches, the scye depth measurement [the distance of 0 – 1 in a draft when you are making a coat] is always going to be calculated as 1/6th of the chest measurement +7.5 cm or 3 inches.